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Two Years After "Citizens United," Amending the Constitution is Essential
January 21 marks the second anniversary of Citizens United v. F.E.C., where a narrow majority of the U.S. Supreme Court asserted that the Constitution prevents Congress from limiting the amount of money that can be spent influencing our elections. The Center for Media and Democracy is working with a constellation of groups in support of amending the Constitution to reverse the decision and address the distortion of the democratic process.
The 5-4 Citizens United decision struck down bipartisan clean election laws and declared that Congress could not limit so-called "independent" spending by corporations or others. In the two years since that decision, the 1% have been playing an increasingly outsized role in our elections, holding even greater sway than they had before 2010. Deep-pocketed CEOs and corporations have filtered many millions of dollars through Super PACs like American Action Network and secretly-funded non-profit groups like Karl Rove's Crossroads GPS, spending made possible by Citizens United and the district court decision SpeechNow.org v. F.E.C.
Exceptionally Costly, and Exceptionally UnpopularThe first elections after Citizens United were the most expensive in U.S. history, with more spending coming from outside groups than from the candidates themselves. In modern elections, 9 out of 10 races are decided by who raises more campaign cash. Given this reality, it stretches the imagination to believe elected officials won't be indebted to those deep-pocketed donors who help them get the edge over their opponent.
The 2012 elections are expected to once again set new records for spending. And the money that flows into this year's campaigns will come overwhelmingly from the top one percent. Only a tiny sliver of Americans donate to elections, and the bottom ninety-nine-point-five percent who can afford to contribute will have their dollars drowned out by the million-dollar contributions made possible by Citizens United.
The decision is not only unleashing an exceptional amount of spending -- it is also exceedingly unpopular. A Pew Research Center poll released Tuesday shows 65 percent of voters from both parties who know about the Citizens United decision believe it has had a negative impact on politics. Additionally, a poll released Wednesday from Main Street Alliance, the American Sustainable Business Council, and Small Business Majority shows that 66 percent of small business owners believe Citizens United decision has been bad for small businesses, compared to only 9 percent who think it's good -- a margin of 7 to 1.
Constitutional Amendment May be Only OptionDespite public opposition to Citizens United, reversing it will not be easy. With money deemed to be "speech" and corporations "people," the narrow majority of justices in that decision claimed the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment compelled the Court to strike down bipartisan rules governing election-related spending. As a result, many believe it necessary to push for a constitutional amendment to reverse Citizens United and related decisions that have distorted the election process.
Several public interest groups have been calling for amending the Constitution since Citizens United was released, including CMD, Move to Amend, People for the American Way, Free Speech For People, Public Citizen, Common Cause, and others, like the Coffee Party, the NEA, and CWA, as well as a new group called "United Republic." Despite some differences in tactics and proposed amendment language, these and other groups have come together in a "constellation," uniting under the banner of a common set of principles and with a collaborative website, "United for the People" (www.United4thePeople.org). The effort to amend the Constitution gained major steam as the Occupy and 99% movements have objected to the distorting role of money in politics and the absurdities of "corporate personhood."
And some legislators have been paying attention.
U.S. Congresspersons Offer AmendmentsIn November 2011, Congressman Ted Deutsch (D-FL) introduced the "Outlawing Corporate Cash Undermining the Public Interest in Our Elections and Democracy" (OCCUPIED) constitutional amendment that would prohibit business corporations from spending money on elections. It would also restore the power of Congress and the states to regulate election contributions and spending, which would prevent wealthy CEOs like David and Charles Koch, or North Carolina's Art Pope, from having an undue influence on elections. In December, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) introduced a companion bill in the Senate, along with Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK). (You can sign a petition in support of the amendment here.)
The Center for Media and Democracy endorsed the Deutsch/Sanders proposal as the most powerful amendment to date in Congress (and got a shout-out from Sen. Sanders when he introduced it).
Other amendment proposals have also been introduced.
Weeks after the Citizens United decision was announced in January 2010, Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD) introduced an amendment, followed in February by a proposal from Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) and Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.), then one from Rep. Paul Hodes (D-NH) in April, and another proposal from Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) in July.
On Thursday, Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) introduced an amendment to deal with public financing of election, a proposal in line with the suggestion of hip hop mogul Russell Simmons.
In total, ten amendments have been offered in the 112th Congress. Others have been floated but not yet introduced, like the proposed amendment from the "Move to Amend" coalition.
Amendments Differ, But Reflect Need for ChangeThe introduction of each amendment helps advance this vital issue and reflects the depth of support for reversing Citizens United. While the precise language and impact of each proposal differs, they share a common diagnosis: that the democratic process is being unduly distorted by money and corporate influence.
Non-profit law expert Greg Colvin has suggested an analytical framework to help people assess what the proposed amendments do (or do not do), and compared some of these and other proposed amendments.
There is no doubt that amending the constitution will not be easy, but a growing number of Americans believe it is essential. Citizens of all political stripes know the current systems gives far too much power to a small number of rich individuals and corporations.
Second Anniversary EventsHundreds of events are being held this week across the U.S. to protest the decision on its second anniversary.
On Friday, one day "occupations" will be held at hundreds of federal courthouses. A large demonstration is planned for the U.S. Supreme Court, where Move to Amend's David Cobb and George Friday will be joined by Code Pink's Medea Benjamin, the Coffee Party's Annabel Park, TV host Thom Hartmann and others in speaking out against Court decisions they believe must be overturned. "Occupy the Courts" is organized by the Move to Amend coalition.
On Saturday, activists across the country will 'apprehend' corporate impostors posing as 'people' asserting constitutional rights, including an effort targeting Bank of America at their New York headquarters. "Occupy the Corporations" is organized by Public Citizen.
For more information about these and other events, visit www.United4thePeople.org.
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33 Comments so far
Show AllAmending the Constitution...oh, yeah! Well, if you 're gonna amend the Constitution just don't do it to keep money out of politics, do it also to keep government our of women's uterus, out of our bedrooms, out of our cars, out of our wallets, out of health, out of private lives and out of our faces.
I can't help by snicker at the innocence of those who believe that by fixing one thing, everything will be okay. The entire goddamn system is broken, from top to bottom from the inside out. What part of that don't y'all get? The only solution here is to help the Republicans along while they push us over the precipice. Only then, will we be able to start fresh. Till then, anything you come up - not that much is being done - is just a Band Aid on a cancer that has metastized.
There is validity to the points you make. The entire system is corrupt and rotten. However, in this instance, a Constitutional Amendment wouldn't solve the problem (that's a great national delusion, usually found on the right, e.g., the various marriage obsessions -- to fix things once and for all with a Constitutional Amendment).
But a Constitutional Amendment, while it certainly won't come from the elected officials, can be driven by a groundswell of popular support. It has happened before. The model is the 18th Amendment, Prohibition. According to the Ken Burns PBS documentary on Prohibition and Daniel Okrent's book "The Rise and Fall of Prohibition," the demand for the prohibition amendment was driven by churchy small town groups of prohibitionists along with the suffragettes, who thought it would help their cause (it did). Most of the office holding people were not in favor of it, were drinkers themselves, and more than a few perceived the likely adverse outcomes. But once the media blitz of the time began, it was approved, passed, and ratified by the necessary 3/4s of the states faster than even its most passionate backers expected.
It could, if passed and ratified despite the wishes of the office holders, take care of several unpopular realities of current political system. So a clear, concise, comprehensible amendment defining "citizen" as a person rather than an institution, and a second paragraph taking care of the whole campaign advertising aspect of electioneering could. Such a thing will never come through any elected official, who would not vote to cut off this seemingly endless source of money.
Still, if the words were good enough so that they could be seen on TV from signs and banners, and they were repeated often enough so that many if not most people will have seen the words and heard the words so many times they'd memorize them against their will, muttering the words in their sleep. This could . . . could, I say, not would . . . create the needed groundswell.
What an amendment would do is give a basis for laws to be passed, regulations and regulatory agencies to be created (you can almost hear the Republicans squawking at that idea) could happen. I agree that it would just be a bandaid on a badly bleeding wound, but the bandaid might just keep the body politic from bleeding to death while, with the Constitutionality established, other cure options four our corrupt political mess, could be implemented. It probably won't happen, but it could.
"a Constitutional Amendment...certainly won't come from the elected officials"
Then why have ten such amendments been introduced into this current Congress by elected officials?
Elected officials respond to the winds of popular opinion, and now a supermajority of all parts of the American political spectrum are in favor of a constitutional amendment limiting corporate power. There was never a better time in our history for this to happen.
Those ten such amendments did not directly affect campaign contributions, money going to the very politicians who would have to give up that money if it passed. It won't come from elected officials, but if that supermajority of all parts of the American political spectrum were to get enthusiastically behind the politicians and would get on board quickly if that was where the votes to keep them in their high paying jobs were on the line.
No one is claiming that one amendment will solve all of America's problems, but it would be major surgery and alter the core of American law rather than the bandaid solutions of legislation or one court battle after another.
Cynicism has yet to solve anything.
Here's a more detailed breakdown of to donors:
http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/list.php?order=A
Whizzbang - "Prohibition .. " You actually propose Prohibition as a model of a good Constitutional Amendment ? Umm... I hate to break this to you, but ..... it got repealed. SOrry.
B Fisher - you actually suggest Krazy Kucinch and some aging ex-rapper as dispensers of advice on changing the Constitution ????
You do realize, don't you, that KK's 'Amendment' prohibited EVERYONE, including you, including me, from contributing to any campaign for Federal office, right ?
BTW, what about your precious Hollywood millions, Union millions, etc ? Would you like them banned, too ? The biggest single contributor to campaigns in teh 2010 cycle was unions. You want that money, hundreds of millions, to dry up too ?
No, prohibition was a catastrophe. It was a stupid idea to begin with. How it got put in place is what interests me. The amendment I would have in mind and would write if I had the legal and language skills to do so is nowhere yet. There is no current text that I know of that I think would be good.
I promised myself I wouldn't get into back-and-forths on this site, but what the heck; political promises are made to be broken evidently. 1) That the 18th Amendment got repealed was also a groundswell action from a populace that was fed up with it. 2) I don't contribute to political elections so if a law were passed forbidding me to do so, I'd be fine with that. Let the media donate whatever time they feel they can spare (they sell most of their time now so it wouldn't be much) to debates and unpaidfor news coverage. 3) The Hollywood unions are not mine and aren't precious to me and I would be as glad to have their money out of the political process as that of the Koch brothers. I would love to see that hundreds of millions dry up too.
Not to worry. None of it will happen and there may be things in the future that I might "actually" suggest, some of which will probably be dumb ideas.
According to OpenSecrets.org:
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce ($34 million), American Action Network ($22.1 million), the Karl Rove-backed American Crossroads ($19.9 million) and Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies ($16.2 million) and ranked one, two, three and four among outside organizations...All are overtly conservative organizations.
They’re followed in fifth and sixth place by two liberal labor unions – Service Employees International Union ($15.5 million) and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees ($11.8 million).
That's more than 3:1 Right wing over Labor.
The link i posted earlier says different.
Yes, the link Chameleon posted earlier shows a huge tilt of heavy hitters towards democrats.
http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/list.php?order=A
The issue is not one to be resolved by constitutional amendment, but by those principles recognized as underlying the rule of government. Life is "nasty, short and brutish" according to Hobbes who perceives a tyranny as necessary for the amenities of civilization. For Locke the solution lay in a personal happiness, fulfillment secured by property, to serve as bulwark against government authority and deliverer of the amenities of civilization. Unfortunately to obtain and retain property, power is required the which restores the nasty, short and brutish life. Property must be uncivil to wield such power and revolution must be uncivil to overcome such power.
OWS needs to recognize that the revolution is not for Marx necessarily, but decidedly against Locke, father of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. One does not need property for fulfillment, but resources. For property one needs power, but for resources one needs compromise and flexibility -- two very essential qualities for civility, the sine qua non of a civilization that can provide resources.
Those "principles recognized as underlying the rule of government" are what is enshrined in the Constitution, but it was a work in progress and intended to be amended as necessary. In fact, Jefferson and Madison argued strongly for an 11th amendment in the Bill of Rights that would explicitly limit corporate power.
Locke's concept of inviolate rights and delegation of popular authority (the consent of the governed) may have inspired the Founders and Framers, but note that his "life, liberty and property" was deliberately changed by Jefferson to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" - demoting property from the list of core principles.
A return to constitutional human sovereignty (as opposed to corporate sovereignty) is one step in reinvigorating this experiment in democratic republicanism. Another is to restore the commons to the people, as proposed by Thomas Paine in his last pamphlet Agrarian Justice, as well as by Jefferson, Lincoln and the most read political philosopher of the 19th century, Henry George.
A revolution typically solves nothing but replacing one form of tyranny with another.
Actually the phrase "unalienable right to life, liberty, and property" comes from the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia. (It goes without saying, of course, that such "property" included slaves, the primary source of its wealth.) Jefferson substituted "happiness" from Locke, but qualified even that with "pursuit." To have left the original phrase unchanged in the context of the Declaration of Independence would have signaled to the document's audience, the courts of Europe, that some kind of radical redistribution of property was happening in the New World, which was far from the intent of the founding fathers. What brought the wealthy south to the cause of independence was the protection of slavery from the British Parliament. The plantation owners and the Massachusetts radicals had joined forces leaving the other colonies to "Join or Die" as the popular phrase went. After the establishment of the Constituion some twenty years later, the national government (as distinct from the truly "federal" government under the Articles) bought the support of a hostile public by offering a vast redistribution of property in the form of making available virtually free land in the western territories. This basically criminal state of affairs persisted until the early twentieth century -- and now the constitutional government has little but violence to bring to bear against the hostility of its citizens.
WHizbang -
Yes, the process of Prohibiton was exemplary. Of a zealot-fueled feeding frenzy.
"I don't contribute to political elections so if a law were passed forbidding me to do so, I'd be fine with that. ..... The Hollywood unions are not mine and aren't precious to me and I would be as glad to have their money out of the political process "
So, you'd be happy to see everyone's right to choose eliminated by law, on the grounds that your own personal choice isn't changed ?
"Let the media donate whatever time they feel they can spare " So, you'd be content to let the media decide what you are alolowed to hear or not hear ? What if Media Outlet A ( who supports candidates you agree with ) goes out of business, or decides 'not to get involved', leaving Media Outlet B ( whose views and candidates you despise ) as the only political forum ?
BTW, I agree that our political process has become utterly corrupted by money. I believe it happened long long before Citizen's United. I believe both sides are guilty as sin. Just look at the money spent before C U, like in 2008 ( and many years before as well ). So, I'm not disagreeing with that question, only on the proposed restriction on free speech.
You're quite right that it's been corrupted all along and most of the abuses of officialdom that are taking place have happened before. I'm currently reading a book called "Manufacturing Hysteria: A History of Scapegoating, Surveillance, and Secrecy in Modern America" by Jay Feldman which documents (with lots of footnotes) all the abuses and setting aside of laws, rules, and ideal have occurred since the turn of the 20th Century. So much of it reads as frighteningly familiar, so much that's going on now has happened before.
I wouldn't be "content" with anything that has happened or could happen. Letting the media provide "public service" time for campaigns and limiting the time of campaigns and getting rid of the money that buys the incredibly expensive attack ads, enriching the media muchly, seems minimally better than the way things are today. It would have to be "regulated" to eliminate the appearance of bias, and that probably wouldn't work any better than any other attempt to regulate the media. Yet even the right wingers who get media access pay lip service to "getting the money out of politics," but of course, what they mean is getting the other guys' money out of politics.
Free speech has been restricted so many times and so often by the powers that be that getting it to be as for real as those who cite the First Amendment as a guide would wish is unlikely to happen.
Two years really? I think I remember our president saying in a State of the Union Address he was going to do something about it. Has he?
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2010/01/27/six-famous-state-of-the-union-moments.html
There is no provision in the Constitution for the Constitution therefore the Constitution is unconstitutional.
(Supreme Court Ruling State versus people July 18 2014)
A Constitutional amendment must be ratified by the legislatures (that means Republicans and Democrats) of 38 states.
Do we really think that corporate controlled America is going to allow a Constitutional amendment that decreases their power when all the politicians are in their pockets? It's not gonna happen.
The ERA was stopped at 35 states; yet, it had tremendous support. What happened to the feminist movement after all that effort failed? It retreated and has not recovered. Do we want that for our growing movement?
It is not a good use of our time and energy; it is a dead end. (Incidentally, that's exactly why it will get lots of support by liberals. The job of liberalism is to channel mass movements into directions where they cannot challenge the real power structure.)
Paul Cienfuegos, building on the work of the late Richard Grossman, has put a lot of thought into this already. There are alternatives to a Constitutional amendment. There's no substitute for mass grass-roots activism. If we go down the road of "official mechanisms" to change our government, we eventually will find out that these mechanisms were designed to PREVENT change not support it. That's how our electoral system works too. We have the appearance of democracy, but the reality is that the demos (the 99%) has no real power at all. We need to work outside the "official mechanisms." We didn't get the 8 hour day or the weekend through "official mechanisms."
http://www.alternativeradio.org/collections/spk_paul-cienfuegos
The rights we already have aren't much good. Why would the addtional rights provided by a new Constitutional amendment change anything?
"Know your rights" by the Clash:
Know your rights all three of them
Number 1
You have the right not to be killed
Murder is a CRIME!
Unless it was done by a
Policeman or aristocrat
Know your rights
And Number 2
You have the right to food money
Providing of course you
Don't mind a little
Investigation, humiliation
And if you cross your fingers
Rehabilitation...
Know these rights
Number 3
You have the right to free
Speech as long as you're not
Dumb enough to actually try it.
Know your rights
These are your rights
All three of 'em...
Or even more uplifting:
When the law break in
How you gonna go?
Shot down on the pavement
Or waiting on death row
The 1% wrote the constitution. We need to throw the whole thing out and start over, not amend a document designed to keep the rich in power and the poor in their place. Americans have listened to government propaganda all their lives and most truly believe they live in the freest and most just country in the world, when in truth the USA became a police state long ago for the lower classes and the middle class has just begun to find out how bad it will get.
Yes, I am sure that the Corporations will be delighted to Amend our Constitution
for themselves. Our elected scoundrels will certainly provide their assisstance.
People are going to wake up to the fact ending Cit U alone is a Slogan! A slogan which can lead to something more substantive or keep them in a nifty little box of thoughtless emotion.
Ending cit u without demanding public campaign finance only, no lobby money, abolition of the electoral college, establishment of multi party proportional representation etc., etc... That might, just might give people who will try to bribe the system a real run for their money.
Ending Cit U alone will lower the cost of bribing our political process... but it won't come close to ending a bribe based system.
"Ending Cit U alone will lower the cost of bribing our political process... but it won't come close to ending a bribe based system."
Correct.
And if you're allowed to give 1 % of your income to a candidate you support, how can someone then say that some other person can not do the same, said prohibition being based on the fact that he's rich, and his 1% is a lot more than your 1 % ?
Our 'democracy' is no more or less corrupted by money than every other sytem of government that mankind has ever evolved. Be it Communism, Socialism, olligarchies, monarchies, dictatorships, what have you - they are all corrupted by money, with varying degrees of openess about that fact. Some admit it, some deny it, some hide it, some do it openly.
Even in societies that were not based on 'money as a virtualization of value', bribes were offerd in real goods - cows, bags of grain, the labor of others, grants of land, etc. The basic concept of the corruption is still the same.
It is 'human nature at it's finest', and will never change.
We have "one person, one vote." Nowhere in the Constitution does it explicitly say that, yet it is implied in the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. Why do you believe we should not have "one person, one speech?"
It is entirely feasible to protect freedom of speech without assuming the wealthy have a right to dominate that speech with their money. An amendment could restate the right to unlimited speech in media that are not resource constrained, such as paper or magnetic media, while allowing for reasonable regulation of speech in broadcast and other media that are resource constrained.
RE: It is 'human nature at it's finest', and will never change.
A true believer in T.I.N.A. (There is no alternative (to capitalism)). If you are not a member of the 1%, you think like one.
Incidentally, show me some conclusive scientific evidence that "human nature" is genetically fixed? The scientific evidence indicates that "human nature" is a product of the material and social conditions (that are historically determined) of a particular society, not the other way around.
It is the 1% that instigate wars, yet all of us (1% + 99%) are violent? It is the 1% that controls 90% of the worlds wealth, yet all of us (1% + 99%) are greedy? I could go on and on. That human nature "will never change" is an anti-evolutionary idea that goes against the evidence and is unscientific. In fact, it is an ideology - promoted by the ruling class.
"The ruling ideas of a society are simply the ideas of the ruling class."
It was once human nature to kill every last thing that moved, but then we developed a concern for extinction. It was once human nature to cut every last tree down, but then we developed environmentalism. Despite our human nature, we have evolved our thinking on issues such as civil rights, feminism, gay equality, and animal rights. There's no reason we can't change our political thinking.
Proportional representation would solve a great many problems, which is why you're unlikely to ever see it in the US any time soon.
* It would soon break the 2 party monopoly by allowing parties, or (as Lani Guinier called them) interest groups, representation with a relatively low threshold of support like 5-10%.
* Party discipline would force politicians to at least try to live up to their promises. A representative of a peace party who votes for increased military spending would be demoted or removed from the party's slate of candidates in the next election.
* Therefore, voters really need not concern themselves with the personal views of a particular candidate. They need only know what the party itself stands for. Individual candidates would have less of a need to "get their message out" except perhaps in primaries. This would largely eliminate the need for advertisements in the general election and would reduce the influence of money on political campaigns.
I think that instead of just amending the constitution to deal with this (seriously important) issue, we should be focusing on creating a political system where these sorts of anti-democratic decisions are no longer possible.
We need to start pushing for a constitutional convention in a similar spirit to those that have taken place recently in Ecuador, Iceland, and Venezuela.
It's a big demand, but it's possible, if we choose to do it, and would address the problem of Citizen's United and related "corporate rights" cases, as well as problems as diverse as environmental destruction and bank fraud.
A Constitutional Amendment needs to do two things:
1) Eliminate corporate (or any group) personhood and explicitly state that a group of people do not derive from their members any rights, but that membership in a group does not diminish the member's rights as an individual acting as an individual.
2) Restate freedom of speech and expression in media that are not resource constrained such as paper or magnetic media, but grant government authority to regulate the amount of resource contrained media (such as broadcast) used by any individual, but not to the extent of completely excluding any individual from the use of that media.
Amend the Constitution? What Constitution? Better yet, what's this Constitution you speak of and does it have anything to do with the right of the citizens to buy arms?
It's very distressing to see such cynicism about this Constitutional amendment on corporate personhood, which, if passed, would be a big step toward bolstering what remains of participatory democracy in the United States. Cynics here in these Common Dems threads seem to argue a couple of points.
1. The republic is hopelessly corrupt and essentially dead; and
2. You'll never get it passed through Congress.
On point No. 1, if you accept this premise that the republic is dead, then the solution for citizens probably is to just watch TV and maybe stop voting. Alternatively, you can prepare for bloody revolution. I sometimes feel this level of despair, but I also feel like not giving up on the political process because that's what plutocrats count on you to do. The argument against despair is that the ability to amend the Constitution actually is possible, so why not put some effort into it.
Point No. 2 is more pragmatic. And I think people should pause a little to consider why it is that a popular movement might have a difficult time getting legislation or a Constitutional amendment passed by their so-called representatives. Is it because the Republicans are obstructionists? Well, no. If you recall the Democratic majority that existed when Obama was first elected, it didn't matter at all that the Dems had a majority. We still got the right-wing corporatist agenda. The real problem here is the duopoly itself. If you are not thinking third party here, then you just don't get it. The country really has to get some political smarts first; then it has to push its agenda via a third party. There is no other way.
Given that the cynics have some points, why is it necessary to rally behind this Constitutional amendment to eliminate corporate personhood rights? It's because this is the heart of the matter. As the article states, electoral campaigns getting the most money are shown to have a high probability of succeeding. That means that the people will never have sovereignty until corporations are restrained from their current positions of power.
This is the fight, and it's high time to get behind the effort, as well as third-party electoral drives. If people falter here, there are two choices: tyranny or violent revolution. There is no "centrism" or restoration of balance. That's gone long ago. Corporations write the legislation now. With the Citizens United decision, open graft is now legal. Most people (the 99 percent) don't have the means to match this economic control. All you have is your numbers, which still mean something under our present bastard republic. If people were totally bereft of power, then the Supreme Court would not have bothered to vote up the Citizen's United decision.
So, please stop being cynical. Support Move to Amend and other attemps to abolish corporate personhood. When thwarted, let us rally behind a third-party effort.
One thing that isn't cynical is to point out that although some of these anti-Citizen's United efforts are springing up via Democratic Congressional representatives, the Democratic Party won't in the end back the legislation. That's OK. We have a long way to go. It will be important to show up the Dem Party - that it really is OK with the Party that the Citizen's United decision keeps the corporate cash flowing. That's what the party is all about, and people who vote for the Dems need to see that. Such lessons of betrayal must be repeated again and again unitl people finally give up on a party that doesn't represent them.
We can only hope that people will wise up sooner than later. That's our hope, through education and citizen empowerment. The alternative is total corporate control. That's where we are headed right now under the status quo.
So, buck up. Have a little courage and get behind this effort, which will be a long-haul proposition, but a very good one to back.
Hmmmm
Brendon I have a question for you: Are you crazy? Allowing the ruling elite to convene a Constitutional Convention would be virtual suicide for the Republic.
The ruling elite just demonstrated to the entire world how much power they have over the people by writing Ron Paul right out of any chance for the nomination by ordering the entire US main stream media to destroy his campaign. And when that failed in Iowa they cheated. I am sure they just cheated again in SC. Ron Paul was running neck and neck with Romney 5 days ago. Since then both Romney and Newt had major revelations exposing just how bad they really are. Ron Paul had relatively speaking no negatives exposed to the public. And yet tonight Ron Paul somehow went in 5 days from tied with Romney to a very distant 4th place. And you believe that? why is it the polls are only wrong for Ron Paul?
Back to the point about Citizens United. We don't need to change the Constitution. There is NOTHING in the Constitution that grants corporations anything let alone super citizen status. What we need to do is impeach the Supreme Court and put justices in that will enfoce the Constitution as it is written. I wouldn't let those crooked, evil scumbags get anywhere near our Constitution. By the time they were done the entire Bill of Rights would be stricken. And what they have been doing illegally for the last decade in direct violation of the Bill of Rights would suddenly not just be legal but Constitutional as well.
A convention controlled by the same scumbags that have been screwing the American people for decades. I think NOT!